WI No Bush in 2000

Elizabeth Dole could do well, but would Republicans be willing to vote in a woman in 2000? As for Dan Quayle, this would be completely ASB with his performance as Vice President.

Agreed at 1.5 rather than fully both conclusions. Conservatives tend to embrace female executives (or would-be executives) in government; e.g., Mrs. Thatcher; Gov. Palin. However, the boost the women get usually comes from the more brittle, lockstep Right (e.g., well -- Mrs. Thatcher; Gov. Palin). Sec. Dole did reasonably well in the earliest period of RTL GOP/2000, but as a mainstream GOP candidate in the course of the first set of Republican primaries where the SocCons and NeoCons held an unbeatable grip on the party. (National security conservatives and their Establishment cohort seemed irrelevant in the last fading fever of the post-Cold War, pre-GWOT days.) McCain still seems like the most likely bet with Sec. Dole waiting for her last hurrah with a single Senate term a few years on.

Meanwhile, the audio of Dan Quayle announcing for the presidency answered the Zen koan, "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Doubtful if a W vacuum would have been filled by him rather than someone whose political gravitas amounted to such small potatoes.
 
I am not so certain that in the absence of Bush the "GOP Establishment" (a rather vague term in any event) would have united behind some other governor--not every governor after all is a president's son! And I'm not even sure they would all oppose McCain--in 2000 McCain's "maverick" image was partly strategy--since the "Establishment" was backing Bush, he would be the maverick, anti-Establishment candidate. It was not inevitable that he would do so in Bush's absence.
 
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